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Ken Dark

School and Department Director of Academic Tutoring

Areas of interest

Most of my research is on first millennium AD Europe (including Britain) and the Middle East, on the early history and archaeology of Christianity, and on archaeological theory and method in its interdisciplinary context. As part of the latter, I am interested in the implications of the pre-modern past for 'big questions' in social science.

Postgraduate supervision

I welcome PhD applications in the archaeology or history of the Roman Empire, Late Antiquity, the Byzantine Empire, Early Christianity, or in archaeological theory.

Research centres and groups

Background

After an Archaeology degree from the University of York, I obtained my PhD in Archaeology and History from the University of Cambridge, and then spent ten years on the academic staff of first the University of Oxford, and then the University of Cambridge, before moving as a lecturer to the University of Reading. Since then, I have been promoted to Associate Professor, and then Professor, of Archaeology and History.

Academic qualifications

  • PhD, Archaeology, Cambridge
  • BA, Archaeology, York

Awards and honours

  • Henry Myers Lecturer (Royal Anthropological Institute)
  • Kathleen Hughes Lecturer (University of Cambridge)
  • Awarded honorary professorships and fellowships by universities in the EU and US

Professional bodies/affiliations

Websites/blogs


Selected publications

Research-Based Books

  • Byzantine Pottery, Tempus, Stroud, 2001. 160pp.
  • Britain and the End of the Roman Empire, Tempus, Stroud, 2000. 2nd Edition, 2002. 256pp.
  • The Waves of Time. Long-Term Change and International Relations, Continuum, London and New York, 1998. 284pp.
  • Theoretical Archaeology, Duckworth and Cornell University Press, London and New York, 1995. 256pp. (Published in Chinese and Japanese translations 2004 and 2006).
  • Civitas to Kingdom. British Political Continuity 300-800, Leicester University Press, London, 1994. 322pp.
  • Discovery by Design. The Identification of Secular Elite Settlements in Western Britain AD 400-700, Tempus Reparatum, Oxford, 1994. 197pp.

Edited Books

  • Secular Buildings and the Archaeology of Everyday Life in the Byzantine Empire, Oxbow, Oxford, 2004. 132pp. (Editor).
  • External Contacts and the Economy of Late Roman and Post-Roman Britain, Boydell ad Brewer, Woodbridge, 1996. 190pp. (Editor).

Short Monographs

  • Nazareth Archaeological Project: A preliminary report on the archaeological work at the Sisters of Nazareth Convent in 2009, Late Antiquity Research Group (LARG), London, 2009. 36pp.
  • Sepphoris-Nazareth survey: a preliminary report on the second season's work in 2005, LARG, London, 2005. 20pp.
  • Sepphoris-Nazareth survey: a preliminary report on the first season's work in 2004, LARG, London, 2004. 42pp.
  • Istanbul Rescue Archaeological Survey. 2004. The districts of Deniz Ardal, Seyit Ömer, Ereğli, Ibrahim Cavuş, Melek Hatun and Beyazıt Ağa, LARG, London, 2005. 42 pp. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • Istanbul Rescue Archaeological Survey. 2003, The districts of Fatma Sultan, Arpaemini, Ördek kasap, Molla Şeref, Murat Paşa, Inebey, Yalı, Çakıraöa, Kürkçübaşı, Kasapilyas, Cerrahpaşa and Nevbahar, LARG, London, 2004. 29 pp. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • Istanbul Rescue Archaeological Survey 2002. The districts of Sofular, Iskender Paşa, Edirnekapı, Sarigüzel, Fatih, LARG, London, 2003. 25pp. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • Istanbul Rescue Archaeological Survey 2001. The districts of Fatih, Zeyrek and Karagümüruk. First Preliminary Report, LARG, London, 2002. 37 pp. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • Istanbul Rescue Archaeological Survey 1999. The districts of Balat and Ayvansaray. First Preliminary Report, LARG, London, 1999. 57 pp. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • The Early British Court. Place-names and archaeology, LARG, London, 1999. 42 pp.
  • Istanbul Rescue Archaeological Survey 1998. The districts of Yedikule and Kocamustafa Paşa. First Preliminary Report, LARG, London, 1998, 45 pp. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • Brawdy Hill-Fort Excavations. Interim Report 1991, Brawdy Research Project, London, 1991. 19 pp.
  • Brawdy Hill-Fort Excavations. Interim Report 1990, Brawdy Research Project, London, 1990. 31 pp.
  • Brawdy Hill-Fort Excavations. Interim Report 1989, Brawdy Research Project, London, 1989. 21 pp.

Publication of Named Lecture at the University of Cambridge

  • Archaeology and the Origins of Insular Monasticism (= The Fifth Kathleen Hughes Memorial Lecture, given in 2004), Cambridge, 2006 (28-page academic pamphlet in the series publishing the Kathleen Hughes Memorial lectures).

Papers and Notes in Academic Journals

  • ‘Nazareth Archaeological Project: five years of work at the Sisters of Nazareth convent in central Nazareth’ Bulletin of British Byzantine Studies 37, 2011, 39-47.
  • 'The Hagia Sophia Project, Istanbul: report on the 2009 season' Bulletin of British Byzantine Studies 36, 2010, 40-49. (Co-authored with J. Kostenec).
  • ‘Nazareth Archaeological Project 2009’ Bulletin of British Byzantine Studies, 36, 2010, 34-40.
  • ‘Constructing Melchior Lorichs’s Panorama of Constantinople’ Journal of the American Society of Architectural Historians 69.1, 2010, 62-87. (Co-authored with N. Westbrook and R. Van Meuren).
  • ‘Extending internalisation theory: From the multinational enterprise to the knowledge-based empire’ International Business Review 18.3, 2009, 236-256. (Co-authored with M. Casson and M. A. Gulamhussen).
  • (Review article) 'R. Salm. The Myth of Nazareth', Bulletin of the Anglo-Israel Archaeological Society 26, 2008, 140-146.
  • ‘The eastern harbours of Early Byzantine Constantinople’ Byzantion 75, 2005, 152-163.
  • ‘The New Post Office site in Istanbul and the north-eastern harbor of Byzantine Constantinople’ International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 33.2, 2004, 315-319.
  • ‘Houses, Streets and Shops in Byzantine Constantinople from the fifth to the twelfth centuries’ Journal of Medieval History 30, 2004, 83-107. .
  • ‘The Last Roman Imperial Palace. Rescue archaeology in Istanbul’, Minerva, 12.4, 2001, 52-55. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • ‘The Byzantine church and monastery of St. Mary Peribleptos in Istanbul’ Burlington Magazine, November 1999, 656-664.
  • ‘New Archaeological and Palynological Evidence for the Sub-Roman *Re-Occupation of Hadrian’s Wall’ Archaeologia Aeliana 5.24, 1996, 57-72. (Co-authored with P. Dark).
  • ‘A Sub-Roman Re-defence of Hadrian’s Wall?’ Britannia 23, 1992, 111-120.
  • ‘The Plan and Interpretation of Tintagel’ Cambridge Medieval Celtic Studies 9, 1985, 1-17.
  • ‘Celtic Monastic Archaeology, Fifth-Eighth Centuries’ Monastic Studies 14, 1983, 17-29.

Papers (Chapters) in Edited Volumes)

  • ‘A new archaeological study of Hagia Sophia, Istanbul’ in I. Iliev (ed.) Proceedings of the 22nd International Congress of Byzantine Studies, Sofia, 22-27 August 2011, I, Plenary Papers, Bulgarian Historical Heritage Foundation, Sofia, 2011, 213-37. (Co-authored with J. Kostenec).
  • ‘Globalizing Late Antiquity: Models, metaphors and the realities of long-distance trade and diplomacy’ in A.L. Harris (ed.) Incipient Globalization? Long-distance trade in the sixth century AD (= Reading Medieval Studies 32), Archaeopress, Oxford, 2007, 3-14.
  • ‘Early Byzantine mercantile communities in the West’ in C. Entwistle (ed.) Through a Glass Brightly, Oxbow, Oxford, 2003, 76-81.
  • ‘Proto-industrialization and the economy of the Roman Empire’ in L'Artisanat Romain: évolutions, continuités et ruptures. Actes due 2e Coloque d'Erpeldange 26-28 Octobre 2000 (Instrumentum monograph 20), M. Polfer (ed.) Instrumentum, Montagnac, 2001, 19-29.
  • ‘The Late Roman transition in the North: a discussion’, in The Late Roman Transition in the North, P. Wilson and T. Wilmott (eds) Archaeopress, Oxford, 2000, 81-88.
  • ‘Culture and the Myth of Economic Determinism in Global History and World Politics’, in Cultural Factors in Economic Growth, M. Casson and A. Godley (eds.) Springer, Berlin, 2000, 182-209.
  • ‘Proto-industrialization and the end of the Roman economy’, in External Contacts and the Economy of Late Roman and Post-Roman Britain, K.R. Dark (ed.), Boydell and Brewer, Woodbridge, 1996, 1-22.
  • ‘Pottery and local production at the end of Roman Britain’, in External Contacts and the Economy of Late Roman and Post-Roman Britain, K.R. Dark (ed.), Boydell and Brewer, Woodbridge, 1996, 53-66.
  • ‘St. Patrick’s uillula and the fifth-century occupation of Romano-British villas’, in St. Patrick AD 493 1993, D. Dumville et al. (ed.), Boydell and Brewer, Woodbridge, 1993, 19-24.
  • ‘Roman-Period Activity at Prehistoric Ritual Monuments in Britain and the Armorican Peninsula’, in Proceedings of the 1st TRAC Conference, E. Scott (ed.) Avebury (Worldwide Archaeology Series 4), Aldershot, 1993, 133-46.
  • ‘Epigraphic, Art-Historical and Historical Approaches to the Chronology of Class-I Inscribed Stones’, in The Early Church in Wales and the West, N. Edwards and A. Lane (eds.), Oxbow, Oxford, 1992, 51-61.

Shorter Published Papers and Notes

  • ‘Introduction’ in Secular Buildings and Everyday Life in the Byzantine Empire c.400-c.1200, K.R. Dark (ed.), Oxbow, Oxford, 2004, 1-3.
  • ‘Rescue Archaeology in Istanbul’, Bulletin of British Byzantine Studies 28, 2002, 38-42. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • ‘Discovering the New Rome’, British Archaeology 58, 2001, 14-18. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • ‘Rescue Archaeology in Istanbul’, Bulletin of British Byzantine Studies 26, 2000, 34-38. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • ‘Rescue Archaeology in Istanbul’, Bulletin of British Byzantine Studies 25, 1999, 36-41. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • ‘Rescue Archaeology in Istanbul’, Minerva 10.5, 1999, 22-25. (Co-authored with F. Özgümüş).
  • ‘The E-ware sherd’, in Eastbury Farm, Carhampton, C. and N. Hollinrake (eds), C. and N. Hollinrake, Glastonbury, 1998, 118-121.
  • ‘Byzantine Petrology Project’, Bulletin of British Byzantine Studies 25, 1999, 98-99.
  • ‘Centuries of Roman survival in the West’, British Archaeology 32, 1998, 8-9. *
  • ‘A Byzantine Warrior at Tipaza?’, Byzantion 65, 1995, 247-248.
  • 'The Constantine Bowl’, in Byzantium, D. Buckton (ed.) The British Museum Press, London, 1994, 191-192.
  • ‘The Constantine Bowl - a Late Byzantine Diplomatic Gift?’ Burlington Magazine December 1994, 829-831.
  • ‘Cypriot Sgraffito bowl’, in Byzantium, D. Buckton (ed.), The British Museum Press, London, 1994, 213.
  • ‘Town or temenos? A Reinterpretation of the Walled Area of Aquae Sulis’, Britannia 24, 1993, 254-255.
  • ‘The Science of Archaeology’ Philosophy Now 3, 1992, 21-22.

Publications